


ugly words; ugly trolls

by translevi



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Character Study, F/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Vriska-centric, each chapter is based on an "ugly word", redrom, troll society is fucked
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-27
Updated: 2017-11-01
Packaged: 2019-01-06 01:11:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 3,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12200979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/translevi/pseuds/translevi
Summary: cacophonyconfused noise(Vriska isn’t a good person, she’ll be the first to tell you that. She doesn’t pity, she doesn’t feel anything.)





	1. cacophony

**Author's Note:**

> these will all be set within the same verse ill add details at the bottom

 

_“You pity him, don’t you?”_

The problem with Karkat, is that he’s everywhere. His movies litter the main area, his sickles have left gashes in the training dummies and the walls, even his color - a bright red that she cannot stare at for long - clothing, walls, furniture. She can’t get away from it even if she wants to.

Vriska hums, staring at the ceiling of her block. Terezi’s words ring clear in her ears as she mulls it over.

Karkat has always been there, not in her way, not really doing much, just there, taking up space. She has no opinion on him, really, he did what he did and she did what she did. Sure they’ve been spending more time together recently but, there weren’t many options left these days.

Karkat is loud, and Karkat is the ‘leader’, she doesn’t care about him.

_That’s not true._

The old her whispers, digging it’s nails into her arm, reminding her of days spent millennials ago. Days when she had dipped too deep, too far. She just wanted to tease him, wanted to make him come crawling back be it by his will or not. And she saw.

She saw too much, not enough, and didn’t speak to him for a week afterwards.

She can feel him now, at the edge of her conscious, like she feels everyone else around her. Minds for her to tap into; for her to manipulate.

Vriska isn’t a good person, she’ll be the first to tell you that. She doesn’t pity, she doesn’t feel anything.

 _Wrong_.

Her mind echoes back, and the pinpricks of nails send starbursts of pain up her bones.

She has seen him cry.

What she saw in his mind she repressed for years, with other more pressing matters like the _end of the world_ to attend to, and whatever she was fooling herself with Tavros. Dying. She had her hands full. She forgot and she pushed and she pushed until she was at the breaking point herself.

Then John punched her.

She woke up hours later, with a cold dread of understanding threatening to drown her in it’s salt. She found Karkat, and she found him alone.

Equius, Nepeta, Eridan and Gamzee. All dead. And here was their fearless leader crying.

She sat by him for what could have been days, could have eons. The hollows of space accepting his cries and wrapping them around newborn stars, blanketing them with the weight of his heart.

It brought it all back.

She fell to pieces and Terezi put her back together. Vriska righted herself, and here she is now, bending at a concerning angle for something she’s not sure if she’s ready to feel.

She makes a noise, confused, and waits for the horrorterrors to consume her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> differences from canon:  
> \- vriska lost her right arm and eye  
> \- kanaya killed gamzee and eridan at the same time  
> \- its retcon  
> \- terezi and vriska originally have a pale/red thing going on  
> \- karkat is moirails with kanaya  
> \- vriska apologized to everyone  
> \- vriska has depression, ptsd, and is generally just absolutely terrible at taking care of herself  
> \- the "huge 8itch" is a mask she developed at an early age that eventually shattered, mild personality disorder


	2. cataclysm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> flood, catastrophe, upheaval
> 
> (She remembers the fear.)

She’ll admit, she doesn’t remember much of Alternia. Which is strange, considering she spent a good majority of her life there. She doesn’t remember a lot of things.

There are flashes of it from the old her, what she’s done. But it never stays long.

She does remember the events. The crack of Tavros’ spine echoes in her eardrums, the searing pain she felt from her own eyes before she ripped away from Terezi, echoing haunts of the soon to be dead. She remembers those things.

She remembers the fear.

Her lusus was not kind, nor was she merciful. She cared, in her own way - wrapped Vriska in her silk when her arm and eye exploded, protected her, demanded - but it was all wrong. Her mother cared for her as lusi of her color do, viciously. She started flarping so young, started watching so young. You’d think a spider would suck the blood - and she did - but she ate the bodies.

_ Screaming, cracking, begging, blood, blood, blood-- _

...

The meteors were loud.  Loud and they shook the ground when they plummeted down. She saw the fire, saw the destruction, but she didn’t feel remorse for the lives lost due to the creation of the game. She hated troll society, and she hated herself. They were better off dead.

God tier hurt - or maybe that was the bleeding out - it hurt so much but it filled her with life. She saw the path she needed to take, one for gold and glory, all the luck for her and only her. The fight, the end, their loss of the new world.

_ In those blissful moments of sleep she saw what Terezi saw, her back, Jack. She sees Karkat and Terezi dead and thinks without hesitation, that Terezi should have killed her anyways. _

Her mask shatters and who she was is loss to the roaring tide of regret.


	3. chafe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> irritate, abrade
> 
> (He is a mutant, but a world of mutants spawned under his hand.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: discussions of injury

Karkat’s skin is often dry. He scratches frequently, dragging sharp nails across his sweater, picking at scabs on his hands from his sickle, he never leaves his injuries alone. For his hatred of his color, there is a deeper underlying fascination with red. She had seen him once or twice at his land, watching the pulsating rivers of red.

Vriska does not dig for his thoughts. Not there.

Those thoughts are his.

The humans share his color, and the revelation she knows stirs him, just as it did with Jack.

He is a mutant, but a world of mutants spawned under his hand.

Blood.

The life-force that runs through their veins, an aspect of bonds, his aspect.

A knight, an active class that protects their aspect; blood, the aspect of unity. Someone that protects unity.

It fits, Vriska thinks, for someone like Karkat to be a knight of blood, someone so hellbent on protecting their friends that all else can be sacrificed for it.

Gamzee, Eridan, Nepeta, Equius, Feferi. All lost, and he mourned.

In troll society murder is expected, murder is a way of life. It is a horrible way but it is a way. No other troll would hesitate like he does - never to say that he is weak - no other troll would care. Caring was the seed of defeat.

 _Look where it got you_. _She_ _whispers_.

But Karkat does not hesitate. He screams himself hoarse, ranting and raving, sacrificing his safety, his everything to face the situations he believes he’s created. A protector of unity; their fearless leader.

Karkat’s skin is often dry. He scratches frequently, dragging sharp nails across his sweater, picking at scabs on his hands from his sickle, he never leaves his injuries alone. The blood he sheds is a bond, a tie as much as a chain. He has attached himself to everyone, deserving of it or not, and will sacrifice himself for those bonds.

He has a fascination with his blood, for as mutated as the color itself is, it is the most royal color she has ever seen.


	4. coarse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> common, crude, rough, harsh
> 
> (“You’re an asshole.” Stings the barb, echoing what she already knows.)

Karkat is not gentle with his language, harsh even when he is soft. He is rough around the edges and vulgar at the worst of times. To say she was any different from him would be a lie.

Her apologies whirl together in her mind, eyes betraying suspicion and hatred, vile reminders of what wicked things had spilled from her tongue, from her mind as _she_ sought control.

Vriska finds him in a hallway. Things have been strange between them since she had comforted him out there, under the stars.

She knows and he knows and she knows he knows and it is a cycle of stupidity and bullshit that leaves her feeling like a wriggler suffering under the wrath of their lusus for the first time.

“Karkat, I need to talk to you.”

She’s still adjusting to the sound of her own voice, hollow and lacking the air of confidence; of certainty.

He turns and there is that same undercurrent of disgust he can’t hide that she sees in most every other person that looks her way. His is different, he hates himself, not her.

_(Maybe her a little bit.)_

“This had better be important.” He growls, crossing his arms and shifting his weight onto the other foot, staring at her unimpressed.

_His mind lingers just at the edge of her conscious and there is shame, shame, shame, so much shame, shame for his color shame for his tears shame for his action and inaction all at once._

“I’m sorry.” All her cards on the table, a meager hand.

Karkat blanks, against her conscious and across his face, looking at her as the cracked sound of her confession rings around the empty corridor. It’s always so empty.

“What?” All the time around Kanaya has yet to teach him eloquence.

“I fucked up.” She’d cry if she felt anything, the ache in her chest is as old a friend as Terezi now, her tears have long since dried up. “I fucked up so badly.”

He has never seen her like this, maybe in the throes of anger, of self hatred, but never the weakest most docile part of her. A child, she’s still a child they’re all still children and all their friends are dead and dying.

He won’t see her tears for years and years, till her body falls to the earth and nature claims her, turning her blood into water and letting it rain centuries of pain down across valleys, cities, and all of everything in between.

“So yeah. There.”

He still hasn’t responded yet and she doesn’t know why she cares so much about the opinions of each troll she apologies to.

 _They’re your friends._ The traitorous, _fiendish_ part of her whispers as she turns on her heel, ready to head back the way she came.

“Hey.”

But it’s never that easy with Karkat, is it?

“You’re an asshole.” Stings the barb, echoing what she already knows. “Okay? You’re an asshole. You’re a huge greedy bitch that gives me headaches and pisses me the fuck off.”

 _See, whispers the hands around her throat, closing in in in with the dark_.

“But you’re not a bad person.”

The cold sinking into her veins stops, her movement halts. What?

“Okay, listen. You did some bad shit, some fucked up stupid taint-chafingly awful shit. But, fuck I mean, I  did too, all of us have.”

She’s scared to turn back to face him, scared to be weak.

“I’ve heard what you’re doing okay? I’m not that stupid, not as bad as fucking-” A vague hand gesture, he shakes his head. “Egbert look, anyways, if you’re serious about getting your shit together? I’ll give you a second chance.”

His voice pitches louder, his eyes spark brighter.

“Hell! I’ll give you a third chance, I’ll be the fucking rehab fairy of chances, sprinkling fucks to give and cold hard paps onto your ass-backwards blue blood bullshit. I’m a fucking idiot, unfortunately, too much time living with all of you. So you can turn in this voucher right here.”

And he mimes it, pretends to write something down, fakes ripping it off and throwing it in her general direction.

“For one free chance! Courtesy of the asshole in the sweater, alright? But don’t expect this shit from anyone else. All of you pains-in-the-nook are draining me of my intelligence I swear.”

It’s awful, the worst motivational speech she’s ever heard in her life probably. Sprinkled with curses and seasoned with terrible metaphors, and her blood pusher fucking _squirms._

_She thinks of the sound of rain, not like Alternia, but like Earth. Soft, gentle, pattering against the window and ceiling._

“Thanks, Kar.” The softest she’s ever been.

His eyes soften, just for a moment before he hardens them. She feels his walls go up.

“Don’t mention it, Serket.” And there is so much left unsaid.


	5. cynical

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> distrustful, self-interested
> 
> (“How dare you!” Karkat whirls around with a howl)

At her core, past peeled back layers of bitter hate and waves of her personality she doesn’t remember creating. She is selfish. Vriska Serket is not one to consider others, to consider what others want, she gets what she wants, when she wants it, _because_ she wants it.

Even in her lightest hours that will not change, she will always be ruthless and vicious, self-seeking in her own satisfaction.

The free chance Karkat had given her slipped away, retracted after her latest assault on his good will.

“Con air is a good movie!”

“Like _hell_ it is.” Karkat hissed, arms crossed and face twisted into a snarl. “Why can’t we watch one of _my_ movies?”

“We _always_ watch your movies.” Vriska whined, drawing out the last syllable of ‘always’, dragging it on. It isn’t true, they switch back and forth regularly, her adventures, his sappy romances.

“Oh you are _so_ full of it.” Karkat snarled, stalking forward and jamming his index finger against her sternum. The possibly intimidating effect of his nail digging in through layers of clothing is lost when he looks up at her. She is a good 5 inches taller than him.

She holds the grin off her face, knowing the sight of her teeth would only make him hissier.

“Why don’t you like Nic Cage--”

He cuts her off with an exasperated yell of a noise, whirling around and walking away, throwing his hands in the air.

“I knew it!” Karkat yelled, voice underlying a growl. “You _have_ been hanging out with Egbert.”

She scoffs in response, this is familiar, this is playful, she ~~loves~~ likes it.

“Well,” She shifts her weight, jutting out her hip, hand on her chest. She grins, all sharp teeth. “At least _John_ has good taste in movies.”

“How dare you!” Karkat whirls around with a howl, face flushed red with faux-rage, hands balled into fists. “That’s it.” He spits. “Don’t ever talk to me again.”

Her ace comes into play.

The smile drops from her face slowly, replacing it with a long of distraught denial. Her eyes go wide, hand dropping, all self assuredness gone.

Karkat freezes.

“Oh.” She says, voice meek and soft, tearing her gaze away from the other trolls face, looking to her right. Her hand comes to rub at the back of her neck, she can feel her tangled hair against the back of her hand.

“You can pick the movie, I just… Con air is important to me.”

“No, hey, I mean. Wait…” Karkat backtracks, fumbling over words, out of the corner of her eye she can see his hands come up. He swears under his breath, stepping forward.

“You can- ignore what I- what I said you can pick the movie.”

She snapped back up, face splitting into a grin as she chimed “Aww, thanks Kar!”

He blanked, putting two and two together but his gaze narrows into a glare. “You’re evil, Serket.” Karkat growled, stalking out of the room to go retrieve their popcorn from the microwave rooms over, leaving her to put the movie on.

She flashes her best winning smile at his back before moving over to the dvd player, dropping to her knees in front of it and pushing the eject button, stopping in her popping open of Con Air’s case.

At her very core, she is selfish, ruthless and vicious, self-seeking in her own satisfaction.

 _You’re getting weak_ , _She_ reminds her as Vriska stands back up, shutting the dvd case firmly and throwing it on the side table.

She plucks Karkat’s movie from where it had ended up on the couch cushions. She hurries through the motions, skipping through the previews as fast as she can and starting the movie, pausing it on the first black screen.

She throws the case somewhere inconspicuous just in time for Karkat's footsteps to echo through the hallway.

Her blood pusher speeds up, unable to keep the grin off her face as he kicks open the door from where he had left it ajar, coming back in with two bowls of popcorn. They always used two, under the impression it would stop them from fighting, but they always ended up squabbling over the one remaining bowl at the very end anyways.

Deep down she looked forward to it, looked forward to the way Karkat would shovel popcorn in his mouth, eyes trained on the screen he wouldn’t realize the bowl was empty until he had been fiddling with it for a minute.

She didn’t help either, reaching over from her armchair (sometimes falling out of it) to snatch pieces here and there.

He plops down on the couch huffing, getting comfortable while looking at the screen, rolling his shoulders.

“I hope you don’t expect me to go _easy_ on this abomination of screentime.”

“I wouldn’t want anything else.” She sing-songs, snatching her bowl and a few pieces of his popcorn, dropping them into her mouth with a victorious laugh, ignoring the slight ache in her hand from where he had playfully slapped at her.

She curls up in her arm-chair, laying with her back on the seat and kicking her legs up. She hits play on the remote, looking away from the screen towards Karkat as the name of the movie is slowly drawn in over a scenic view of a snow-filled wonderland.

His confusion is palpable, before the title comes in enough for him to read it and he shoots an accusatory glare in her direction, locking eyes with her unexpectedly. She knows she’s been caught staring. She pops another piece of popcorn in her mouth, flashing a grin and then dropping a piece of popcorn on her face instead of in her mouth, distracted by the red flush on his cheeks as he resolutely stared ahead at the screen.

Her satisfaction will always come first, but she’s come to learn that sometimes other troll’s happiness bring her more satisfaction than her own.


	6. decrepit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> worn-out, run-down
> 
> (the feeling she’s come to name as regret bubbles out of her throat)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> its very hard to upload when the place ur staying at requires u to restart the router everytime u get on ao3
> 
> i ran the numbers n this fic will probably have 25 chapters!

The lack of sopor makes sleeping a nightmare anymore. Never done alone and never all at the same time. She knows how she sleeps, knows how her teeth gnash, and her nails claw, snarls ripping her vocal cords to shreds. She has seen the marks of her nightmares on her moirail and though Terezi soothes and doesn’t seem to care about the marks Vriska leaves on her, the feeling she’s come to name as _regret_ bubbles out of her throat all the same.

Terezi sleeps easily, softly, unhurt and unsnarling, never bothered by the chanting whispers of the horrorterrors like they bother her. Promises of carnage and leaking rainbows never come to her like they do Vriska.

That is a lie.

They come for Terezi like they do any other trolls, but no other troll has a moirail like Terezi does.

_Even if they did, even if some nights their sleep is an inky blackness, they will never know the reason why._

Vriska’s mind control is good for more than hurting trolls she is supposed to protect.

Her conscious dips and waves, straining her and exhausting her more than she already is, running on so little sleep. Terezi has given her everything and more, she will gladly burn to protect her from heat.

And soon, that is true for Karkat.

He, like her, like all the others, doesn’t sleep often. He wears himself out, going and going and _going_ until his body physically gives out on him. She has found him like that before, with Kanaya curled around him, dragging him from where he had collapsed against a wall towards somewhere safer.

During their movie nights, sometimes, she puts him to sleep.

Her mind dips out, weaving through the hallways of his conscious, tracing feather-light touches against memories hanging in them before finding that one switch and _snap_ -ing him off.

He slumps and slowly, selfishly, she moves to the couch with him, laying his head down in her lap and studying his face in ways she cannot while he is awake.

A dead-sleeping target brings them faster.

She can feel them thrum against her own thinkpan, fingers running through his hair as she weaves herself into his mind. She wraps around him like a shield, extending her very self as a barrier between him and the vacuum of space.

The horrorterrors know her.

The poke and prod a her weak spots like they have done before, like they will still, and she snarls, the echo of her threat ringing around the empty space of his mind. They push closer still, her own barriers are worn and tired, they will raise hell for her the next time she falls unconscious, but for now _she_ comes alive and _she_ rages.

Howling, snarling, vicious and foaming, _she_ screams them away from him, stretching herself thin to protect him from the sleeping coils his very species. They bite at her, and her head swims under the weight of it, but she doesn’t care.

They will have her a thousand times before they have him once.

Hours later, she feels when his mind starts to bubble back to the surface, and slowly, gently, _she_ pulls away.  _She_ sheathes her claws, draws the bubbling snarls back into her own; and to Vriska's gentle insistence, _she_ resumes her dormancy. Vriska pulls away quickly, far, _far_ away from the vibrant but never overwhelming presence of his mind, before re-taking her spot in her chair

The menu screen of the movie is playing on loop, she can’t remember any of the jingle despite it playing for hours.

He wakes up groaning, sitting up and slowly curling in on himself, rubbing at this templse as those exhausted, bloodshot eyes open.

Vriska smiles, putting on her best, winning grin and cooing. “Did you have a nice nap, crab-cake?”

He growls, muttering under his breath something similar to ‘ _too damn early for this.’_ despite no concept of time on the meteor before he stops, hand freezing in its motion.

“Yeah.” He says hesitantly, confused, brow furrowing. “I did.”

“Wow.” She has always been a good actor. “I guess shitty rom-coms are the secret to a good sleep. You’ve always been ahead of the loop, Kar, I’m impressed.” All cheerful lies.

Her playful barbs aren’t enough to bring him out of it though, making a crude hand gesture in her direction before grabbing the remote to jump back, determined to finish where he left off.

She leaves to go make more popcorn, rubbing at her pounding temples and letting her posture slump as soon as she was out of his sight.

She will never tell him, never willingly let him know. What she does, what she has done, what she will do; those are hers, and even as she stumbles in her walk, taking a moment to lean against the wall and right her center of balance. She would never regret doing this, not for either of him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i read and really appreciate all the comments i am just super shit at responding! thanks for sticking with this!


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